


The Three Sisters

by lferion



Series: Time's Champion [5]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who: Virgin New Adventures - Various Authors
Genre: Angst, Classic Who, Gen, Metaphysics, Poetry, Screenplay/Script Format, Time's Champion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1996-11-30
Updated: 1996-11-30
Packaged: 2017-10-07 07:47:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/62968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lferion/pseuds/lferion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Time's Champion would lay his burden down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Three Sisters

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the 'Time's Champion' cycle/meta-thread that ran through the Virgin New Adventure books of Paul Cornell, Kate Orman, Ben Aaronovitch and sundry others.
> 
> Written, designed, built &amp; performed by Jennifer Tifft, with input &amp; assistance from Kate Orman, Leigh Ann Hussey and Naomi Walenta.
    
    
    Cast:  
    TIME  
    DEATH  
    PAIN  
    The FOURTH FIGURE
    
    The stage is in darkness. Silence. Then, quiet strains of music.  
    After a moment, a light comes up to reveal The FOURTH FIGURE center  
    stage, standing with his back mostly to the audience. He has an  
    umbrella.
    
    [Ideal: a spot & downlighting that will leave upstage still in shadow]
    
    He is pensive, contemplative, a little weary about the shoulders -   
    leaning a bit on the umbrella. As the light comes up he straightens,   
    looks around, pats his pockets Doctorishly, and finally turns toward  
    down stage. (Does not see or interact with the audience. For all   
    intents & purposes they are not there - witnessing & participating  
    only through the mirror, as it were.)
    
    The music softens [segues into Counterpoint tune]. The FOURTH FIGURE  
    pulls an object from his pocket.
    
    FOURTH FIGURE:   
    	Time, thy favor I must now return,  
    	My span is done, the candle that burned  
    	Bright in thy cause now dims to an end  
    	So weary of war, let me now descend.
    
    (TIME appears upstage right)
    
    Pain, thy guerdon I've bourne & for aye  
    	Dear is the coin I've spent in the fray  
    	But dearer the lives, the smiles & grief  
    	Known on the way - cherished & brief.
    
    (PAIN appears upstage center)
    
    Death, a favor I ask now of thee:  
    	That mine be the life you take as your fee  
    	Cut not off short the strands woven bright  
    	Leave the clocks wound, the candles alight.
    
    (DEATH appears upstage left)
    
    Compassion & mercy I do ye entreat  
    	On all whom I've touched, in small & in great:  
    	Companions & foes, the cross-fire-caught,  
    	Remember their names, & mark what they wrought.
    
    During the first three verses, The FOURTH FIGURE has been moving  
    some in downstage center/right. When he gets to the fourth verse,  
    the lights come up a little on the Sisters, and he turns. He knows  
    they have been there all along (they are *always* there, potential  
    in the dreamspaces).
    
    The fourth verse has more movement, restrained, but with intensity,  
    directed toward the Sisters. He ends up mid-center stage.
    
    When he finishes, [the music swells a little, dies back] there is a  
    beat, silence,
    
    PAIN:  
    (steps forward, skirts rustling, hard, unyielding. The first verse  
    is delivered with chill, implacable knowledge.)
    
    Twice-born fool,  
    	'tis not the nerves raw agony that makes  
    	my guerdon real, nor the sear of sharpened words:  
    	It's all in how you take them, for true Pain  
    	is in the mind, the soul, the heart.  
    	Sensation is the least of what may wound -  
    		And I know what it takes  
    		to make you scream.
    
    She draws the nails of her left hand (or the rose) down slowly over  
    his left shoulder. He *does*not*scream*. She turns abruptly from him,  
    going to down stage left. TIME steps forward a little, and he approaches  
    her. They interact (something with the butterfly?) during:
    
    [Very quietly, a new strain of music emerges]
    
    PAIN:    
    (still unrelenting, up)
    
    Time's Champion, you say,  
    	who sacrificed the Jester for the Mage  
    	and lives yet to regret dis-parate choice -  
    	knitting up the frayed and tangled strands,  
    		Encouraging the butterflies, the dancing bees,  
    		Conspiring with spiders spinning webs  
    	While she stands, silent, keeping count -  
    	Inexorable as sand within the glass.  
    		And there are no second chances  
    		where witness makes all real.
    
    DEATH has moved down to center, behind The FOURTH FIGURE, silent,   
    watching him. There is a frozen, pleading moment when he turns, sees  
    her, approaches, sinks down. [The music here is only a thread of sound]
    
    PAIN:  
    (Warmer, with compassion but not relenting)
    
    This choice you've made before  
    	  Ishtar knows the taste of that decision,  
    	  Huitzilin, Davros, Heaven, Earth & Hel  
    	  A list too long to number, yet will not be forgot:  
    	The things you've died to do, prevent, restore -  
    	  	the peaceful green yet reeks   
    		of blood and chequered choices.
    
    (At the transition between verses The FOURTH FIGURE rises,  
    proud & despairing, resigned but not defeated (think Logopolis & Caves  
    of Androzani) determined. He takes a couple of swift steps away from the  
    tormenting vision, stops. Alone.)
    
    PAIN:  (Cooler again)
    
    But, have you had a proper care? Kept in mind  
    	the ones you've left alone, behind?  
    	Thy conscience knows the names of all thy ghosts   
    		(oh John, where is thy Joan?  
    		Not meant to be alone)  
    	Composed of contradiction, light and shade:  
    	You disrespect the architect, yet labour still for Time.
    
    (At the last line, The FOURTH FIGURE looks upstage to TIME.
    
    During the next verse, PAIN, TIME & DEATH spiral around The FOURTH  
    FIGURE. TIME & DEATH end up back upstage, a little closer together &  
    to center than they started. PAIN makes another circle, and returns  
    to upstage center (so the Sisters make a curve, focussed on the   
    FOURTH FIGURE). [Music is a threnody, a hint of insistence]
    
    PAIN:  
    	Do you think that we don't know just how much  
    		you will allow?  
    	  Such curious control you exercise:  
    		You play for Time in earnest,  
    		Bargaining with Death,  
    		Appeasing Pain -  
    	  No stranger, you, to sacrifice  
    		Juggling with knives  
    		with lives  
    	  Playing off the middle 'gainst both ends.
    
    How long can you go on,  
        		Storm-summoned, wind bourne,  
    		grounding out the lightning, causing sparks -  
    		embracing both cacophany and reason?  
    	  No comfortable colour marks your eyes,  
    	  that see too much and not enough.  
    	The wind blows bright and bitter:  
           		 you know her coat will not keep out the cold.  
           		 And who is there who might call you by name?
    
    [The music changes] The Sisters are all back upstage, The FOURTH  
    FIGURE is center, supported by the umbrella. The light on the Sisters  
    begins very slowly to dim)
    
    PAIN:  
    (Compassionate, a hint of wonder at the end -- the interaction has  
    affected her, too)
    
    We none of us know mercy past amusement,  
    	and yet,  
    	  Who but Time can tell?  
    	for yet, despite all desolation -   
    	still there is the sound of children,  
    		Laughing
    
    [The music gains a hopeful, upturned note] as The FOURTH FIGURE looks  
    up, and *smiles*.
    
    Lights down, music fades out. All exit.  
    

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally performed at Visions '96, as an entry in the Masquerade Show. The piece took Best in Show and Audience Favorite.
> 
> This emerged from a somewhat heated discussion on Rec.Arts.DoctorWho of the place of both poetry and costuming in fandom in general and Who fandom in particular. Many of the participants thought that both were of the sad/loser/shouldn't be there category. As both a costumer and a poet, I decided to show-not-tell why that was not necessarily the case.
> 
> An mp3 of the soundtrack exists. [Link goes here when I figure out where to put it]


End file.
